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She whispered an apology to the vines as he dropped the snips. ‘Something wrong?’ she asked him.
‘They slipped,’ he said, and she smiled.
Game on.
Already her mind was ticking over—how long should she give him? How much time before the inevitable happened and he had to admit defeat? Because if the pruning was going to take this long, she might as well do it herself.
He dropped the snips again and cursed.
‘Having trouble?’
‘I’m out of practice, that’s all.’
‘Let me know if you want to give up. I won’t hold it against you.’
‘Not a chance,’ he growled, and started snipping in earnest.
And before long she didn’t have to hold herself back. She was easing off the brake, keeping up with his newly acquired pace, matching it and then matching it as he ratcheted up the pace again. She kept a close eye on what he was doing, looking for shortcuts he was taking, searching for faults, but his work looked faultless, as sure and as certain as her own.
Damn.
By morning teatime they’d completed the first two rows together. They dropped the snips into a bucket and spread out on a mat Josh had delivered with a basket Gus had prepared for them. The mist had cleared from the trees and now the air was cool and sharp, under a thin blue sky almost cloud free, and Holly was considering how she was going to spend the next six weeks with this man by her side, knowing he could do the job he’d promised to do, knowing what that meant for the future of Purman Wines.
The deal might have already been done and dusted and Franco long gone.
And now all she had to hope for was another Chatsfield scandal.
Not too much to ask for, certainly not too much to expect, but the way her luck seemed to be running lately …
‘What’s wrong with your grandfather?’ asked Franco, interrupting her thoughts as he took a bite from a slab of cake after Josh had disappeared.
She blinked and looked over at him. ‘Pardon?’
‘The wheelchair,’ he said. ‘Why does he need it?’
‘Pop had an accident on an all-terrain bike,’ she said, ‘a four-wheeler. He hit a depression and it flipped and pinned him by the hip. He was lucky, as it happens.’
Hesitation. ‘And he’ll be okay?’
She looked at him suspiciously. ‘What are you worried about? That your precious contract could blow up in your face if something happened to Pop?’
‘Maybe I was just asking after his welfare.’
And she felt shamed that she had jumped down his throat and wondered what it was about this man that put her hackles up. She nursed her coffee in her hands and blew on the surface. ‘He’ll be as good as new, so long as he does his exercises. He’ll be walking before harvest.’
‘Why isn’t Josh helping with the pruning?’
‘He doesn’t like to. Reckons he’s all thumbs.’ She shrugged. ‘Lost the tips of a couple of fingers once so I can understand he’s not keen. But he’s a whiz in the cellar door, as well as managing the sheep we use to keep the grass down in winter.’
‘So, how am I doing. Am I a “whiz” in the vines?’
She poured more coffee from the thermos and surveyed him under her lashes. He was propped up on one elbow on the waterproof rug like he owned it, long and lean in his moleskins and oh-so-relaxed. He knew damned well how he was doing. ‘I’ve seen worse,’ she conceded, and curse him to hell and back, he chuckled as she handed him his mug.
Curse him to hell and back, she liked the sound, even if she knew he was laughing at her.
‘High praise,’ he said as he took off his new Akubra with his free hand and dropped it on the ground, raking through his hair with his fingers.
Her own scalp tingled at the sight. She knew how those fingers felt in her hair—like a caress against her scalp. She sipped her coffee, wondering again how good they would feel against her skin. Hating herself for going there.
‘Holly?’
Her coffee cup lingered at her lips. ‘Hmm?’
‘I asked you a question.’
‘Oh. Sorry,’ she said, hoping the heat in her cheeks didn’t betray just what she’d been so absorbed thinking about. This man would just love to know that. Not. It was hardly the kind of thing she wanted to admit even to herself. She didn’t even like the man and now she was fantasising about how his fingers would feel on her skin.
Madness!
‘I couldn’t help but notice …’ He hesitated. ‘You talk to yourself a lot as you work.’
‘No, I don’t.’
‘I heard you. You talk. A lot.’
‘I’m not talking to myself.’
‘No?’
